Iowa's Tippie Undergraduate Investors Win Krause Challenge

The University of Iowa's Tippie College of Business won the Krause Challenge portfolio management competition in 2008. The UI portfolio, managed by undergraduate students taking the Applied Equity Valuation class, showed a return of 8.1 percent between Aug. 1, 2007 and March 31, 2008.

The Krause Challenge is an annual competition pitting undergraduate student fund managers from UI, Iowa State University, University of Northern Iowa and Drake University. Established in 1998, it is named after William Krause, founder and CEO of Krause-Gentle Corp., who provided the seed money for each school's portfolio. At least 25 percent of the fund must be invested in Iowa-based companies.

As of March 31, the value of the UI portfolio was $228,802. Among the fund's top performers were Principal Financial, Rockwell Collins, Noble Corp., and Apple.